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How Much Money Could the Department of Defense Save if it Stopped Trying to Save Souls?

[T]he Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF) began an investigation into just how much money the DoD spends on promoting religion to military personnel and their families. What prompted this interest...was finding out what the DoD was spending on certain individual events and programs, such as the $125 million spent on the Army's Comprehensive Soldier Fitness program and its controversial "Spiritual Fitness" test, a mandatory test that must be taken by all soldiers.

$28,000,000 for the Fort Hood "mega-church" project ($17,500,000 for its chapel complex and religious education center, and an additional $10,800,000 for its "Family Life Center");

$678,470 for Christian rock bands

$500,000 Oakridge Camp & Retreat Center for "Strong Bond" retreats;

Oakridge not only requires its employees to be Christians, but even goes as far as requiring on its employment application that the applicant state their views on issues such as abortion and homosexuality. While a private religious organization is free to impose a religious test on its staff, it is quite a different matter for a DoD contractor to do this. And, in the case of Oakridge, it is not only the facility's staff who must adhere to the its Christian beliefs, but all of its guests as well, including the soldiers attending Fort Sill's Strong Bonds and Spiritual Fitness retreats.

$12,346,333 to Military Community Youth Ministries (MCYM), "whose mission statement is 'Celebrate life with military teens, Introduce them to the Life-Giver, Jesus Christ, And help them become more like Him.'

$120,000 to Williamsburg Christian Retreat Center for Christian retreats, and also for Christian retreats: $75,000 to Baptist Association's Eastover Retreat Center, $53,000 to American Baptist Church's Canonicus Camping and Conference Center, and thousands more to other centers that "all hire only Christians, and many require in their employment applications that potential employees subscribe to a 'statement of faith' and provide their Christian 'testimony,' detailing when and how they were 'saved.'"

$80,000 to Unlimited Potential, Inc., a ministry "Serving Christ Through Baseball" by sending evangelical Christian major league baseball players to military events.

The above is just a small sample brought to light by Chris Rodda at the Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF), and is limited to only Department of Defense contracts; individual military bases also spend funds on Christian proselytizing programs and events, but that money is difficult to track given the over 700 US military installations in existence.